Atlantis Azores Captain’s Report May 3-10, 2014: Tubbataha Itinerary

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Atlantis Azores Captain’s Report May 3-10, 2014
Tubbataha Itinerary

This week it’s all about the students!

Weather: Scattered thunderstorms early in the week, but then mostly sunny thereafter
Seas: Calm, light chop
Air: 90ish F
Water: 80’s F
Log Entry by Capt’ Todd

A wonderful photography workshop this week, put on by renowned UW cameraman Alex Mustard (check him out in Alert Diver - Summer 2013 issue). That’s right, we had a camera table worth a fortune in high-end cameras and housings (15 in all) that kept the crew busy loading valuable cargo to and from the skiffs! We’re looking forward to “exposing “ our guests to a plethora of subject matter this week.

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Sunday:
The Azores arrived at our first stop at the Malayan Wreck, and while we saw some dramatic weather during the crossing, as storm cells that are common for this time of year were dotted about the flat calm seas and showed up on radar, they were nothing to get excited about, just very neat to look at! Anyway, everyone got “focused” on the first few dives and then we were off to the north end to check out Terraces; a spot rarely visited because of the lack of a mooring there. We “live boated” it so our photography students had an opportunity to capture the area on film and then we then laid in at Shark Airport for the rest of the afternoon and evening. Everyone partaked in an earlier than usual last dive to capture the twilight, as daylight’s a hot commodity on this trip.

Monday: We spent the entire day here at Shark Airport, as Alex liked the terrain enough to re-dive the same sites because of the “Kodak quality”. This trip is all about photo composition, so we’re letting him decide the itinerary.

Tuesday: Decided to run all the way to the south end of the Atolls in an effort to escape the fleet, but they all had the same idea! We wound up sharing our favorite site, the Delsan Wreck with several other boats, but we hesitated on our dive time and were able to stagger and avoid the crowds :cool2: Everyone loved this fantastic wide-angle site, so we re-dove it all day, capturing primarily the local school of jacks here in differing light throughout the day.

Wednesday: We moved just around the corner to SW Wall for the day, and it turned out to be a very smart move, as the winds out of the NE came up and we were nicely sheltered. The nesting triggerfish were unusually aggressive with this bunch at Triggerfish City. My guess is they didn’t like all the cameras (paparazzi) - Ha Ha! Nobody seemed to mind though, and it added a little extra excitement to the dives. Those with a steady hand (and steady nerve) got some great “action” shots of them ;)

Thursday: Black Rock this morning for our first stop, the two groups split up and dove different sites, allowing them to compare and kept everyone a little more spread apart. At lunch we moved to Amos Rock where the afternoon light here was just what they were looking for, and it was all good!

Friday: Mirror-like conditions greeted us at Jessie Beazley and the reef was invisible from the surface on the high tide. Thank goodness for my GPS/plotter! Once again, the team was tickled by the terrain, and they were all such easy guests - they loved EVERYTHING! I had a huge selection of photos to choose from for submission this week (I wonder why?), so you’re getting an eyeful of the best, compliments of the “students” and their “professor”…:D

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